


Structured Catastrophe

by synergenic (Losseflame)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Gen, M/M, Suicidal Thoughts, mentions of self harm, oh god the lost innocence ruins me, the kids are not alright, we forget that they're children but they are
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-25
Updated: 2013-09-25
Packaged: 2017-12-27 15:19:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/980470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Losseflame/pseuds/synergenic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco sometimes thinks about what would happen if he died – what would have happened if he hadn’t survived Trost at all.  He sometimes wonders if they would have all been better off.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Structured Catastrophe

**one.**

On the days that are good, the mornings usually go like this: Jean will wake up or Marco will, it doesn’t matter much, and they will kiss the other awake and most times they’ll fuck, slow and hot and mouthy under the sheets. Until Marco’s sobbing or Jean is, broken prayers of each other’s names on their lips. They usually don’t stop till one of them is sobbing – for some reason. 

And then Jean will get up – this never changes, _Jean_ always gets up first now; before, it was Marco – to start the day, and Marco will remind himself that he is feeling a phantom limb. He can always feel the skin of Jean’s back under his right palm when they fuck, like he had a map of Jean tattooed into his hand that is still traceable in the air and he loves it and hates it, most days.

This is how a good day goes.

Today is not a good day.

Jean wakes up to Marco’s pained hiss and he’s awake in an instant, nerves battle-strung and ready as he props himself up on one arm. “What is it?” he asks, eyes calm, steady.

A little panicked. 

Marco tightens his jaw and jerks his head from side to side, waiting for Jean to understand. Hates it when he does, because Marco can _see_ when Jean realizes the only thing that could be hurting would be if Jean was lying on his right arm, but he can’t be because – 

Because Marco doesn’t have a right arm, he has a fucking _stump._

“Oh,” Jean says, and he just moves to the side like it isn’t a big deal. But he doesn’t move far enough.

He can’t see the boundaries that aren’t there, Marco knows that, but his body registers this as a betrayal and Marco is absolutely helpless to stop the wave of anger that courses through him. “Just don’t bother,” he mutters, sitting up even when Jean yelps for him not to.

Pain blindsides him, sweeping him over, and his stub flails, a little bit, reacting to the mirage of agony. It’s like an impromptu amputation, another one. Marco grits his teeth against the sob that rushes into his throat, making him cough, shrugging off Jean’s hands. 

“Don’t touch me,” he snarls. Pleads. 

Jean backs off and lets Marco fumble through his morning routine, even though he doesn’t have doing it with one arm down yet, even though he clearly needs the help.

Marco loves that Jean is letting him struggle. He absolutely hates that Jean is letting him struggle. 

It’s only when Marco has tried to open a drawer for the third time with ever-increasing strength, a prickling heat spiking behind his eyes each time the goddamn fucking drawer catches, that Jean steps up behind him, slides his arms around Marco’s waist. “Hey,” he mutters, kissing the back of Marco’s neck, “hey, just let it go, it’s okay.” 

The breath Marco draws in _shreds_ his lungs, his vocals chords, as it curdles into a sob half-way through, and Marco tries to shove Jean off unsuccessfully, the boy clinging to him tighter in response. “No, it’s _not_ , stop saying that, you _asshole.”_

He can feel Jean flinch against him, and it makes liquid fury infuse Marco’s chest because this? This isn’t Marco, Marco was never angry like this, bitter like this, cruel like this. Marco doesn’t recognize himself anymore, and he wonders why Jean is sticking around, anyway, when he isn’t – he isn’t what he was before.

He doesn’t know if he can be. 

“It’s not okay, just stop –” Marco whines through his teeth, pushing his hair back and turning around to face Jean fully, to tuck his face into the crook of Jean’s neck and hide the tears. Jean re-adjusts his arms, holding Marco tighter. Marco bites his lip, shudders through another sob. 

This is all he can do now, cry and waste Jean’s time by doing so, they were both supposed to be at breakfast ten minutes ago so they could eat before Jean and the others went to train and Marco went to do fuck all because he can’t do _anything_ – 

“ – and that’s such bullshit, Marco, you’re _not_ useless, okay? Fuck that, c’mon, you know you’re not.” Jean’s voice tunes back into Marco’s hearing, and Marco realizes he must have been babbling. Jean has always been an insensitive ass, even around his best friend – it’s like he’s missing the parts other people have that allow them things like tact, Marco thinks – so his voice is awkward, unsure, but his arms are steady and his hands comforting as they rubs circles into Marco’s back.

And it should help, it should ground him or _something_ but it doesn’t, at all, Marco’s mind still lost in a spinning sense of grief and boredom and pity and pain. His ears are ringing, and his throat is aching with his sobs, now, his body shaking with them and he can’t speak through it, can barely breathe through it. 

Jean guides them until he is sitting on the bed and Marco is in his lap, legs ironclad around his waist and arm curling around his shoulder. Marco’s fingers are tangled in Jean’s hair and he can feel Marco tug, every so often, a particularly forceful sob tightening his hand. He’s never been good with comforting people, not even his younger siblings, so he’s not sure if he’s doing this right, saying the right things or if rocking them back and forth is good or if he should keep rubbing Marco’s back.

But Marco _clings_ , like Jean is the center of his gravity or some shit, like Jean’s important – like this is helping, so Jean hauls him in tighter, presses kisses up and down his neck as Marco shakes and cries. 

The door to their room opens, and Jean freezes up. Marco doesn’t notice, lost in his loss. 

Corporal Levi’s face appears, Jean’s muscles stringing themselves tighter across his bones, if possible. Jean doesn’t really have any problems with the man, or his language, or his reputation, but –

But the reason people talk shit like Levi is that there’s an inherent aggression to those kinds of words, a forceful kind of anger that Jean doesn’t think Marco needs to be around right now, and he shifts his arms around the boy in question, protective.

The Corporal hitches an eyebrow, runs an assessing gaze over the situation, and steps back, closing the door again. 

Jean breathes a sigh of relief, and throws his weight so that he can tangle himself up with Marco on the bed.

**two.**

“Oi, cocksucker,” Levi’s voice is loud behind Jean, and Jean stops, shoulders hunching up to his ears. Turning slowly, Jean watches the short man stride towards him, somehow intimidating even just doing that. 

Beside him, Sasha squares her shoulders, shoving the rest of the potato she stole from fuck knows where in her mouth, gripping his palm. Jean grimaces at the grainy remainders of potato that squish against his skin. 

“I won’t abandon you, Jean,” Sasha chokes out fiercely around her mouthful, swallowing loud enough to make Jean wince when Levi finally arrives.

Levi gives Sasha a deadpan stare, and Sasha’s mouth purses, her eyes widening and her features stretching into something manic as she engages Levi in a staring contest – to defend Jean’s honour, probably, because Sasha is completely fucking insane. 

Breaking eye contact with a muttered ‘what the fuck’, Levi turns to Jean, holding out a key. 

“Um,” Jean says, unsure. Levi rolls his eyes, releasing a sigh so ball-shrinking in its disdain that even Sasha frowns, shifting from side to side as if deciding whether or not Levi’s being mean to him or not. He squeezes her hand reassuringly. 

“You won’t lose training over him,” Levi bites out, shaking the key. A key to the supplies shed, Jean thinks in wonder. “If you can’t make it sometimes because he needs you there, like fuck I’m going to say no, _but_. You. Will not. Lose training over him. You will make it up on your own time. Do you understand?” 

Swallowing, Jean reaches out to pocket the key. “Yessir.” He salutes, for good measure. 

Levi eyeballs him. “Good. You’ve got too much fuckin’ potential, shouldn’t fuckin’ die your first expedition.” 

The he neatly turns on his heels, walking away. 

“I have the weirdest boner right now,” Sasha supplies helpfully.

Jean does not find this helpful. 

**three.**

It had only been suggested once, that Marco leave the Recon Corps. It had been their third night all together at HQ, at dinner, and the Commander had put his hand on Marco’s shoulder as they were talking, genial and friendly and utterly, utterly false. 

It wasn’t a crazy suggestion – find a place where Marco would be more useful, would have an easier time of it, even if it wasn’t those words, but the silence that spread like venom through the air after couldn’t have been cut with a 3DMG blade. Eren, who had been so polite when they’d gotten here, almost _quiet_ , clenches his fists and the glare that is affixed on his face when he looks at the Commander is molten bright and predatory. His had been the first reaction to the suggestion, and the aftershocks of the statement are read through the minute movements and reactions of the rest of the 104th squad. 

Mikasa, who had been peeling an apple with a knife, freezes, her thumb shifting on the blade and her hold changing on the hilt just enough, her expression subtly shifting from ‘contentedly neutral’ to ‘wrathfully neutral’, Armin’s smile going softer and sweeter beside her as his eyes go corpse-cold. Christa’s lip trembles, Ymir gets one look at that before aggression fills up her frame, Reiner and Bertholdt’s jaws clench and Connie’s disagreeing yelp makes his voice crack. 

Sasha, very carefully, very calmly, finishes chewing and swallowing her mouthful of bread, before she places the loaf on her plate gently and turns in her seat, slowly, to look at the Commander. 

Beside him, Jean doesn’t react at all, and the obnoxious sounds of him consuming his meal seem to be the only sounds in the dining hall.

Marco, if he is anything at all anymore, is still intelligent, and he reads the flicker in the Commander’s eyes before it disappears, sees how the Corporal shifts his weight yards from them. It puts something bright-burning and vicious in his chest when he sees it, because –

He knows the 104th trainee squad is dangerous, but seeing that validated through the Commander’s fear is –

Marco is proud of his squad. 

“I believe I can find some way to be useful here, Commander,” Marco says politely, using the word the Commander had been stepping around. _We just don’t see your use anymore, Marco._

Nodding, the Commander smiles, mouth friendly and eyes void of emotion but assessing his new subordinates meticulously. “Of course, Marco.”

He squeezes Marco’s shoulder, just hard enough for Marco to know that while he may have seen the Commander, the Commander was looking back. 

**four.**

“Don’t be a _pussy_ , Marco, c’mon!” Ymir snarls from where she’s crouched on Marco’s feet, slapping the ground beneath his thigh and Marco wants to spit _poison_ in her face. His stomach muscles feel loose and warm and painful, threaded through with frenetic, over-exhausted energy, and she just keeps yelling at him –

“You could do twice as many three months ago, you pansy, don’t stop now, punch my fucking hand –”

“Three months ago I had both arms!” Marco yells, voice cracking, sucking in a breath before he pushes her away from him harshly, a single strike to the chest.

“Tough shit!” She screams back at him, planting both feet on the ground and towering above him as he gets to his feet. “Want me to cry for you like all the others? Hold your hand and stroke your cheek because poor baby Marco lost his _fucking_ arm, never mind that he’s weeks behind on his recovery because he’s been doing shit all for exercise, give him more fucking time.”

She spits at his feet, a large gob of saliva that soaks into the ground slowly. “You’re better than this self-pity bullshit, Marco, and I’m not an enabler of weakness. You can _use_ manoeuvre gear with one arm if you have enough goddamn upper body strength, you can make up for the loss of depth perception with practice; shit, you can have better balance than you did before if you’d just get off your ass and _do something._ ”

Marco punches her. She punches him back, and three months ago if he’d dug his feet in he barely would have recoiled, but today the blow knocks him on his ass. 

He sees her point. 

“Feel better, princess?” Ymir asks, drawing her arm along her lips, wiping away blood and spit. 

Marco answers honestly. “No.”

Ymir grins, crouches, tugs Marco’s feet together and presses them down gently. “Tough shit. We were at what? Twenty five?” 

**five.**

Marco sometimes thinks about what would happen if he died – what would have happened if he hadn’t survived Trost at all. He sometimes wonders if they would have all been better off.

It’s a stupid thought, and he tries not to think it most days, but –

He’s got a darkness inside him, a sad, bitter, tired mass that moves through him sometimes and makes it hard to think clearly, to breathe without it tasting like the regurgitated blood he had in the back of his throat when Jean found him, one eye and one arm gone and nearly dead. 

He thinks he should be dead, sometimes. 

Tonight’s one of those nights, when the room is empty – and it’s been empty so often, lately, Jean barely showing up to sleep – and there is too much room for Marco’s thoughts to spread. There’s a razor in his hand and he’s pressing it into the soft middle of his elbow and he’s not going to do it, he wouldn’t to that to his friends, but –

He wishes he could, sometimes, without hurting them. 

Marco sighs and shoves the razor back under his mattress and traces his fingers over the thin cuts on his sides and thinks it’s good that Jean apparently hasn’t had time to fuck him, lately. Hasn’t had time to do much with Marco. 

Marco doesn’t want to anyone to find out, ever, what he’s been doing, but he also wants someone to _notice_ , and it’s a sick, selfish little greed in his stomach. The closer they get to the expedition the more Marco feels like they’re settling into a rhythm that doesn’t need him, not forgetting about him as much as not needing his presence in their lives anymore.

Not like they used to.

Not like Jean used to. 

Drawing in a breath, Marco releases it as a soft, resigned sigh, pushing his hair back and adjusting his eye patch. It’s not like he hadn’t thought about this happening, but he’d been hoping… He doesn’t know what he’s been hoping for.

Not this. 

Jean opens the door and startles when he sees Marco awake, sitting on the bottom bunk cross-legged. “Um,” he starts.

“You shouldn’t feel obligated,” Marco plows through whatever he was going to say, knowing that if he doesn’t say it now, if he lets Jean get all the way in and touch him the words will melt under his tongue. God, he’s so fucking selfish. “I didn’t mean to make you feel like you – um, that you had to be there for me. Which you don’t. If you don’t want.”

Jean is staring at him, looking for all the world like Marco struck him over the head with something hard and heavy.

“Which you don’t,” Marco adds, with a small little laugh and he can’t cover up how _sad_ his voice is.

“What,” Jean says, voice flat. “What the fuck.”

He sounds dazed. Might be the relief. 

Marco shrugs and gets up to make busy with his hands, to distract him from the very worryingly real potential for tears. He ends up at the set of drawers, fiddling with the shared detritus they’ve gathered on the surface since living here and Marco’s ears burn as he thinks about sorting through that, post-break-up move-out. “It’s just, I mean, it’s okay. You’ve been spending enough time away for me to understand, so. You could have told me, as well, Jean, I didn’t want to make you do anything that – um, that you –” Marco’s voice starts breaking at the last few words.

“Oh, God,” Jean says, and his voice is one of horrified revelation. “Oh, fuck, Marco, _no_.” 

And then Jean is hugging him from behind, pawing at Marco’s shoulders to turn him around and Jean is _clinging_ to him. “Sorry, fuck, Marco, I’m so sorry for making you think that. I was – god, it’s fuckin stupid – I’ve been doing a lot of extra training, um, Levi gave me the key for…for reasons and. I never. That was never what I was thinking, Marco.” 

Gripping Marco’s chin, Jean kisses him, leaning his weight into it to back them up against the wall and Marco hiccups in a breath when Jean wedges a thigh between his, rocking into Marco and gripping Marco’s hips in a way than grinds him tight against Jean’s leg. “Oh,” he sighs into it, and he knows what makes Jean hot, how to lean his neck back all submissive, how to arch his voice into soft sounds that make Jean _force_ him to get loud. 

Jean growls into the kiss, bites down on Marco’s bottom lip and suckling before shoving his tongue gracelessly into Marco’s mouth, tangling it with Marco’s own. It’s horrifically sloppy, with them essentially just dry humping against their wall, and Marco laughs, pushing Jean away for a moment.

He sways confusedly, brows knit into a frown as he looks at Marco, disgruntled. 

“Bed,” Marco points, and then Jean trips over his feet and tangles two of his buckles trying to get undressed quickly. 

“Fuck,” Jean mutters, and Marco laughs again as he tugs Jean towards him, picking away at the mess Jean made of his gear. Even one-handed, he’s better with knots than Jean. “I was planning on a smoother move.”

“I know you were,” Marco says, tipping his chin up and smiling when Jean understands wordlessly, kissing him eagerly. “Why have you been training so much?”

Jean shrugs, abruptly uncomfortable, and Marco freezes in his actions, leaning forward to catch Jean’s eyes.

He shrugs again, muttering something incomprehensible. Marco looks at him. 

“…wanna come back.” Marco catches this time. 

“What?”

“I wanna come back from the expedition, um, for you.” Jean trips over his words, reaching for Marco’s hand. “I just – fuck, Marco, I want us to be happy one day, after this is all over, and we both need to be alive for that to happen, so. I’ve been training. A lot. To come back to you.” 

And Marco is stuck on those words, a giddiness rising in him because Jean was talking in a way that would have made Marco roll his eyes, before. How they’re so young, they don’t know what they want, they don’t know what they could keep forever but –

Marco believes Jean, when he says it, and Marco thinks he can believe the option Jean is presenting, the one where they grow up together, get old and ugly together somehow. Happy.

“Okay,” Marco says, and his mouth is dry, his throat is rusty with this huge wordless _emotion_ billowing in his chest that he can see reflected in Jean’s eyes. “Yeah, okay.”

And then they’re kissing again, Jean already half-undressed and his hands clever as they slide off Marco’s pants, reaching for the hem of his shirt. “Wait –!” Marco remembers a half-second too late about the cuts on his sides, and Jean – 

Jean goes absolutely still when he sees them, looking between Marco’s cuts and Marco’s eye. Then he leans down and kisses a cut, drawing his tongue over the rough edging of scab material before tracing it down to Marco’s navel, nipping at the skin.

“I’m gonna suck you off,” Jean declares, grabbing Marco’s cock after licking his palm and giving it a few cursory pumps, just enough for Marco’s hips to twitch. “I’m gonna deep-throat you.” 

Marco bites his lip, half-wanting, half-remembering their last attempt.

“Don’t worry, I asked Reiner for tips,” Jean says, and then he clasps his left thumb hard in a fist, stroking clever fingers over the head of Marco’s cock and pulling back the foreskin. Jean releases a pleased sigh, one that goes straight to Marco’s gut, and then Jean fits his lips over the crown, tonguing at the slit with his tongue first gently, then rougher. Rubbing his thumb up and down the base of Marco’s cock, Jean hums curiously as he take Marco deeper.

When very drunk, Reiner had once referred to blowjobs as wet, warm hugs of penile awesome, and the random occurrence of this memory almost makes Marco laugh until, after he’d gotten about half of Marco’s dick in his mouth, Jean decides he’s impatient and _pushes_ himself on the rest of it. Nosing at Marco’s pubic hair, Jean grins and winks – because he’s a little _shit_ , Marco thinks, hand scrambling at Jean’s hair, his shoulder – before tapping at Marco’s thighs, urging him to widen them further.

Palming at his balls, Jean pulls off of Marco’s cock with an _obscene_ slurp, wiping his mouth with his left fist. “Where’s the –”

And Marco is whining even as he’s throwing the small tub of clear oil at Jean’s face, Jean catching it one-handed with a laugh and settling down between Marco’s thighs again.

Jean sucks rhythmically on Marco’s dick while he’s working Marco open, and Marco moans when he thinks about how it’s sort of like how he sucked on pencil tops, when he was concentrating hard, almost second nature.

The tip of Jean’s finger grazes Marco’s prostate, and he gasps, bucking his hips unintentionally. He starts stuttering out apologies, but Jean just winks at him again, twisting his finger and pressing it up to Marco’s stomach.

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” Marco gasps, starting to babble as Jean works in another finger, taking him time in taking Marco apart. “Jean, shit, I’m gonna –”

Jean waves one of his hands, a quick, wordless ‘I got the warning, now shut up and come’.

So Marco does, in several long, juddering heaves, arching against the mattress and tossing his head from side to side. 

Jean slides up to lie beside him, and Marco blurrily paws for Jean’s dick. “S’fine,” Jean mumbles, jaw cracking with a yawn. “Got off on humping the mattress and watching you.” 

Which is…hot, Marco decides. Something to explore.

He’s almost asleep when Jean speaks again. “No more cuts, right?”

Marco hesitates, because he loves Jean, he does – 

But the darkness doesn’t go away just because he shows up. 

Clearing his throat, Jean tries again. “ _Try_ for no more cuts?” 

“Yeah,” Marco mumbles, fitting himself closer to Jean and tucking his face into the crook of Jean’s neck. “I can do that.” 

**six.**

It’s not a surprise when Eren reaches his breaking point, Marco thinks. It’s in his nature to watch out for people; he’d been watching Eren same as he had been when they were trainees, Titan powers be fucked, and it’s no surprise when Eren reaches his breaking point.

Marco is walking just to walk, to feel blood move through his veins, when he hears furious yelling, the brand of furious yelling he knows second best to Jean’s, and Marco hurries around the corner to see – 

To see Eren, red-faced and anger-fisted, screaming at a paralyzed Petra, her eyes hurt and confused. Erd and Gunther stand a few metres back, watching open-mouthed as Eren just keeps…ranting, and Marco can’t really catch what he’s yelling about but there’s swearing, and insults, and poisonous, poisonous anger. Auruo seems to be trying to sneak away, only to be stopped by one of Levi’s hands on his shoulder.

The Corporal approaches Eren, hands held out in a gesture of peace and Marco can tell this won’t go well. He starts hurrying over.

“Jaeger,” Levi starts, and Eren’s scorching gaze is re-directed there.

“My name’s Eren, you stupid piece of shit pygmy fuck! Fuck you!” Eren snarls, and that’s when Marco reaches them, stepping between Eren and the Corporal neatly and watching as Eren deflates. “Marco…” he mutters, resentfully, breath heaving in his chest. His eyes are watering, his heartbeat is humming-bird fast in his throat, his hands are shaking in a way that is obvious enough to make Marco _ache_. 

Marco has never been sure why he and Christa seem to be exempt from so much in the eyes of the 104th, including being targets of anyone’s temper, but he’s glad for it now. “C’mon, Eren, you’re done for the day.”

He holds out his hand, and Eren glances at it, glances around to see the faces of Levi’s squad and his shoulders hunch up, protective, as he grabs Marco’s hand. He hurries to Marco’s side, and Marco leads them from the training ground slowly, calmly, to take them back to his room. 

Eren is quiet, his breath whistling viciously through his teeth and his anger still blazing brighter in him than Marco thought. Opening the door with a hip-check, Marco leads Eren into his room before dropping his hand, sitting on the bottom bunk. “Alright, Eren, what is it?”

Suddenly Eren is a fidgety, pouting child, eyes darting around the room and fingers fiddling with the hem of his shirt. “I’m fine,” he bites out.

“I don’t believe you,” Marco says, and watches as Eren’s face crumples in on itself at that, shoulders beginning to shake and he thinks Levi forgets how _young_ Eren is. He holds his arm out. “C’mere, Eren.”

Snorting in a breath through his nose, Eren’s shaking arms reach out and his feet stumble, unsure, like Marco might retract his offer and Marco’s heart breaks for this kid sometimes. 

“C’mere,” he encourages, opening his arm wider and catching Eren when he finally makes it, his fingers tangling into Marco’s collar and his legs locking around Marco’s waist. Marco heaves Eren’s slight weight closer, cradles Eren’s head with his palm and rocks them back and forth as the kid cries himself out, sobs wringing his body of strength. 

And it’s funny, because Marco never would have had the strength for this before, but now he can bear Eren’s weight when Eren can’t.

When he needs Marco to.

Shushing him and murmuring nonsense, Marco listens to stuttered, bitten half-phrases of ‘I can’t’, ‘I don’t know how’, ‘afraid’ and ‘symbol’, that word is repeated again and again and Marco will kill whoever decided it was a good idea to put the responsibility of being the symbol of humanity’s hope on a scrawny fifteen-year-old boy’s shoulders. 

Jean opens the door, and Eren is halfway across the room in a second, scrubbing at his face with his hands and trying desperately to get his breath under control again. 

“Fuck,” Eren _whines_ , sounding frustrated and humiliated and as if he’s waiting for Jean to take the shot. Jean is staring open-mouthed at Eren, like he can’t believe how much of an _idiot_ he can be.

“Come here, you dumb, suicidal bastard,” Jean grumbles, stepping forward and enveloping Eren into a hug. Eren lets himself get swallowed by it, lets Jean push and manhandle him onto the bed until he’s squished between Marco and Jean.

There is silence for a few moments until Eren sniffs again. 

“For fuck’s…” Jean grunts, bracing his feet on the bed and lifting his hips, reaching into a pocket and withdrawing a handkerchief. “I know you’re a barbarian, but you know –”

Eren snatches the handkerchief out of Jean’s hand. “I know what to do with it,” he grumbles, sounding stuffed up. Eren and Jean fall into quiet bickering before they fall into silence before they fall asleep, and Marco.

Marco stays up. Thinking.

About a lot of things.

About how well the three of them fit together. 

**seven.**

“Try this on!” 

Marco jumps as something cloth-covered is shoved under his nose, and he looks up to see Hanji standing over him, wide-eyed and grinning manically. 

Low-grade concern begins to hum in the back of Marco’s mind. “Squad Leader Hanji…” he begins as he unwraps the object.

“JUST Hanji, just Hanji’s fine, just Zoe’s fine, too, actually, you know, we’ve known each other long enough.” Hanji squats, and Marco directs his eyes away quickly from the crotch this puts at better viewing level because –

It’s not that he thinks it matters much, there’s just been a few bets going around, and it sometimes looks like Hanji has a bust but it sometimes doesn’t, and –

It’s confusing. Hanji is confusing. 

“Cunt, it’s a cunt, by the way, try it on try it on try it on.” Hanji urges him, slapping at his arm. His flesh one, because he’s holding on to –

He’s not sure what he’s holding on to. 

“It’s an arm! It’s your new arm!” Hanji crows, throwing their arms out to the side and overbalancing, falling on their ass with a thud. “Made out of wood and metal with some electrical wiring for movement, because I’m a genius, fuck whatever short shit says, isn’t it great?”

Hanji’s face is leaning in close to his. Hanji blinks, expectant.

“…yeah,” Marco says, still examining the arm he’s holding and firmly refusing to let himself feel hope. “Hanji, when is the last time you slept? Or ate? Or changed? Or, um, anything else that wasn’t related to this?”

Hanji looks completely blindsided by the question, hands still moving vaguely in the air as their lips twitch around words their mind has been thrown off of. They’d been grounded at HQ until full recovery from their burns, the Commander’s direct orders, but…

Marco’s not sure that it was the best call, giving them so much free time with no expeditions they are absolutely required to be well-rested and functional for.

“Look, um –” he starts, and it seems they recognize his tone because their eyes narrow.

“No, nope, today, right now, trying it on. Hanji will rest later promise, I promise, but MARCO –” They fling themselves close to Marco, and he has to backpedal to keep their foreheads from smashing together. “You have no arm, the _Commander_ has no arm, it’s of _utmost importance_ we begin this work right now.”

Marco resigns himself to defeat, and allows Hanji to haul him to his feet.

“Don’t you worry, I’ll get you back up in the air if it’s the last thing I’ll do! You’ll fly free as a bird! You’ll wish you always had the arm I gave you!” Hanji starts to babble, going over technical details and explaining to him the fit and make of his new arm and Marco –

Marco lets himself feel hope.

**Author's Note:**

> ayyy the amazing Rhea made a podfic [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2450201)


End file.
